gremlinwithapen

[gremlinwithapen]

Febuwhump: Hivemind/Not Trusting Reality

tw: hunger, hallucinations, mentions of cannibalism

There was this constant… Buzzing in the back of their mind.

It had been there for as long as they could remember, but it had grown so much more incessant since they'd reached the surface. It was like somebody was was whispering in the back of their mind in a language they could barely fathom, much less understand.

They'd asked Aurora about it a few times before, but she'd always looked at them in confusion and asked about the last time they'd eaten or something like that. She did care for them, really, but despite their similarities, she couldn't seem to understand that particular facet of their condition.

It did make some sense, though. They were a lot further gone than Rory was. They couldn't even bring themself to speak anymore, coasting along with the signs they'd taught each other throughout their countless hours of captivity. Both had known of the inevitability that awaited them, judging by the soundscape their fellow inmates so often created, so they'd made the best of it.

God, they wished they were still submerged in that chorus of pained groans and angry snarls, still human or otherwise. No matter how much sound they actually made, their presence in their mind always remained muted; the lingering hum rarely managing to snag hold of their attention, and anything that got too loud always disappeared soon after.

Now, every waking moment was bogged down by that horrible static. More than once, they'd caught themself getting lost in it, drowning in the sound. The worst parts where when it started to make sense, like what was happening now. The silence of the night and the crackle of the campfire they were tending was slowly sharpening into a rising wave of hungry, hungry, hungry…

Their stomach growled in agreement, and they had to bite their lip to keep from drooling. They'd already had their food for the day, and the others were getting by on that amount just fine.

It didn't matter that the jerky had disappeared into their stomach without so much as a second of satisfaction. It didn't matter that the remaining supplies tucked into the nearby tent were starting to smell more and more appealing. It didn't matter that the other things—the living, breathing, bloody things—were starting to smell more and more appealing…

When was the last time they'd gotten to have fresh meat? To eat to their heart's content? The idea of being "full" felt like something that had died alongside the rest of the normal world for them.

The smell was getting stronger, and so were the sensations. They could practically taste the meat beneath their teeth, the fluttering heartbeat reminding them of a frightened deer. The image wavered before their eyes like a mirage, shimmering between a half dozen different perspectives. It was a feast, and the rowdy growls and deep, soul-shaking humming were calling for them to join in.

They couldn't stop themself from salivating and reaching out, claws grasping for the food. They ached to take part, to feed, to lose themselves in the existent struggle of the many…

"…ey, hey!" A snapping sound in front of their face forced them out of their reverie. "God, you're so fuckin' weird. You don't sleep, and when I come out here to make sure you haven't been eaten by a zombie yet, you're trying to give the fire a damn bear hug."

They blinked rapidly, looking up as Carmine's face came back into focus. The buzzing at the back of their head died down again, and the vision became as hazy as the rest of their memories.

"Seriously, the least you could do is try and keep yourself alive," she continued to grumble, waving the remnants of her left arm around aimlessly to accentuate her point. "You're the only one that can deal with those two puppy-dog-eyed little shits, so you are not allowed to get yourself killed."

"I'm… sorry?" They reached up to sign with shaking hands as they shook off the last of the hallucination, trying to hide their… Fear? Dread? Disappointment? They weren't really sure.

"You better be," Carmine narrowed her eyes, picking up on something in the little bit of their expression she could see. She shrugged, before pulling something out of one of her belt pockets and tossing it towards them. "Here. You look like you could use it."

They instinctively caught the small, tattered plastic baggie, finding a portion of rations hiding inside. It wasn't much—just an old granola bar, some berries, and a few bits of jerky—but it was food.

"No, I couldn't-" They started, putting the bag down and distracting their grasping hands with the signs before she cut them off.

"Don't start that. It's too fucking late for any of that nonsense," she glowered as she turned around again and started heading back into the makeshift tent. "The kid did his counting thing, and he says we have more than enough to make it back to wherever he's leading us, so take it. If you don't eat it, I will."

With that, Carmine used her remaining arm to lift up the tent flap, offering them a brief glance back at the sleeping forms of the other half of their little traveling party before she let it fall shut behind her.

They were left in that silence—at least, the muted cacophony that had become their silence—again. They glanced down at the bundle of food in their lap. Their hunger was too strong to resist, but the least they could do was make the stuff last them through the night.

As they picked away excruciatingly small chunks of dried meat off a strip of jerky and popped them in their waiting mouth, they wondered how longer all of this might last. Their charade with the remaining humans in their group, their lies to Rory that they were feeling as fine as she was, their ability to remain as… Well, themselves, even if there wasn't exactly enough of them left to form a solid identity.

They knew they'd have to give it all up eventually. Even still, those last vestiges of humanity within them were strong, and wouldn't let go until the end. It was the least they could do for their former self, to live whatever remnants of a life they could.

All they had to do was not eat anybody. Easier said than done, but wasn't that true about everything? They could manage for a little longer. Probably.

[gremlinwithapen]

Whump community Reblog if you hate AI

it ruins the whole point of art

[gremlinwithapen]

FEBUWHUMP 2025 PROMPT LIST

this year's prompts were chosen through an open suggestion poll (in which we received over 4,000 prompts) and a subsequent vote, where 5,019 votes were submitted. the top 28 make up the core prompts, and the febuwhump mod's favourites that remain have become the alternates. the first prompt in the 28, "vocal chords", was our number one prompt of the vote, with 1,625 total votes.

i am so insanely excited to see what you all create with these prompts, and i hope they're inspiring enough to trigger a whole month's worth of creativity for you!

as an extra added challenge, some creators will be undertaking another, smaller goal, of including apples in each of their prompt fills as an ode to the wildly popular prompt suggestion of "apples" that didn't make it through to the poll. this is totally optional, but is a good extra challenge if you'd like to take part in it!

if you have any questions, please check out the faq before sending an ask, or skim the blog's previously asked questions to see if your question has already been answered.

please note: notifying the blog of completionist status will happen through a google form released towards the end of febuwhump, and if you are interested in joining the febuwhmp discord server, the link will be available to do so for one week towards the end of january.

full write-up of prompts and rules under the cut:

FEBUWHUMP 2025 PROMPTS:

DAY 1: vocal chords

DAY 2: holding back tears

DAY 3: pinned down

DAY 4: hivemind

DAY 5: not trusting reality

DAY 6: forced to stay awake

DAY 7: alternate timeline self

DAY 8: bleeding out

DAY 9: necromancy

DAY 10: magic exhaustion

DAY 11: demonic possession

DAY 12: used as practice

DAY 13: “i don’t trust anyone else”

DAY 14: becoming the monster

DAY 15: icarus

DAY 16: eaten alive

DAY 17: power instability

DAY 18: living weapon

DAY 19: death wish

DAY 20: “i did good right?”

DAY 21: put on display

DAY 22: “grab the little one”

DAY 23: gunshot wound

DAY 24: forced to beg

DAY 25: bound and gagged

DAY 26: concealing an injury

DAY 27: post-victory collapse

DAY 28: recovery

ALTERNATE PROMPTS:

is there a specific day’s prompt you don’t want to fill? here are ten alternatives you can switch them out for!

ALT 1: major character death

ALT 2: blowtorch

ALT 3: pick who dies

ALT 4: body swap

ALT 5: die a hero

ALT 6: emergency surgery

ALT 7: body horror

ALT 8: on the run

ALT 9: in another life

ALT 10: feeding tube

RULES:

soft rules:

prompts should be answered in the form of whump

creators can produce any kind of media they want

you don't have to complete all the prompts to take part

you can use the prompts after the event ends

you can complete them in tandem with any other event

you can post to any platform you want, however this blog will only be sharing links and prompt fills posted to tumblr

if you want to be featured on the hall of fame, you must inform this blog by the 3rd of march that you have completed all of the days using the provided form

if you have questions, consult the faq before asking

hard rules:

to be a completionist, you must complete all 28 prompts, in order, in whatever medium you want, before the end of the event

(specifically for being featured on the blog)

when uploading febuwhump content to tumblr, please use the tags:

febuwhump (or febuwhump2025)

the relevant day's tag e.g. febuwhumpday1, febuwhumpday2...

nsfw (if relevant)

any important trigger warnings

you can also tag the blog: @febuwhump

I cannot guarantee your work will be archived on the blog. a random selection of properly tagged works will be reblogged every day of february.

[gremlinwithapen]

what's your favorite "that's out of character they must be really sick" tip-off? i think mine has got to be "uncharacteristically quiet" but "unusually late" is also really good.

[gremlinwithapen]

tw: crying, ostracized whumpee, (redeemed) villain whumpee, don't look too far into it I made this in a couple of hours to get the emotions from something unrelated out

"I-I'm sorry! I didn't mean it!" Villain sobbed as she stared fearfully up at Hero, arms clasped tightly around her sides. "I-It was supposed to be a joke! I don't even watch those kind of movies…"

"Hey, hey, whoa," Hero raised their hands as they stepped into the room, trying to get a word in among the younger super's cacophony of emotion. "Slow down. What happened?"

"I-I was just talking with everyone, and e-everything was fine. I s-said something a-about a couple of civilians I w-was helping being fr-frustrating, a-and I joked a-about going all 'horror movie monster' on th-them," Villain whined, shaking softly. "Y-You know, weird s-superpowers a-and all. I-I don't know, I j-just blurted it out, and then they were all staring at me, a-and I saw one of th-them reach for a w-weapon-" "Th-they thought I was g-going to hurt them, Hero," her voice dropped to a whisper. "E-even after everything I've d-done, all th-the work I've b-been doing to be g-good, they thought I w-was going to hurt them."

"Oh, Villain," Hero murmured as they crouched down to be on her level, still a foot or two away to give her some space if she needed it. "I… Well, I'm not sure what they were thinking. But what I am sure of is that you aren't going to harm anyone here anytime soon. You've been trying your absolute hardest after everything Supervillain did to you, and you're doing amazing."

"B-But aren't you g-going to do something? W-What if I w-was going to d-do all that? Shouldn't you t-take my powers, j-just in case?"

"What? Villain, I'm not going to take anything from you. You just made a mistake, okay? We all say stupid things sometimes, and you didn't deserve to be treated like that after one throwaway line," they said, reaching out to lightly grasp her shoulder. She flinched momentarily but didn't pull away, even leaning into it a little. "All I need you to do right now is to learn from this and to not let it keep you down. You're a wonderful person, inside and out, and we're both gonna keep fighting to make everyone see that. Take as much time as you need to pull everything back together, but then I want you back up and doing your thing."

Villain didn't answer, but Hero knew that deep down, their words had gotten through. They stood up again, brushing their hair out of their face.

"Do you want something to eat, bud? You've been in here since this morning," they smiled, holding out a hand for her to grab if she wanted it. "I think the cafeteria's already closed, but I've got some emergency snacks back at the lab."

She seemed to pause for a moment, a numb fog of exhaustion creeping onto her features as her overclocked emotions finally ran out of steam. She nodded weakly as she grasped their outstretched hand, staggering to her feet.

"There we go. Let's get you somewhere a little comfier than an old supply closet, and we can figure it out from there," they said as they guided her along through the now empty halls.

"Thank you," she whispered as she stared off into the middle distance, her voice raspy from crying. Hero could tell they had a long way to go, but they knew it was worth it. It would always be worth it.

"Don't mention it," was all they said back.

[gremlinwithapen]

There's something hilarious about how so much subsequent media has positioned Vampires and Werewolves as, like, binary opposite entities, and then you read Dracula (1897) and realize that wolves are that guy's preferred solution to every problem. You'd say something to Dracula about "ah yes, werewolves, vampires' great eternal enemies," and he'd just be like "you mean my subcontractors?"

[gremlinwithapen]

I recently saw an image of someone explaining that they rotate their blorbos in a hotdog roller. This made me realize that there are many different ways one can mentally rotate their blorbos. This revelation has left me with a question, and now I must find answers.

[gremlinwithapen]

You know, getting hit by a mysterious magic blast because I jumped in front of my friend and then slowly deteriorating over time (physically, mentally, you name it) because of some unknown spell while the rest of my party desperately and fruitlessly searches for a cure probably wouldn’t fix me, necessarily. But it sure would make everything a lot more interesting.

[gremlinwithapen]

Replanting (Chapter 1)

[read on ao3]

When you feel the missile clip the corner of your mech's leg joint, you know it's over.

It feels like a line of white fire directly to your brain; your pain and the mech's mingling. But pain is nothing, pain is your every day. It's the immobility that terrifies you. Your mech knows before you do that the leg won't work, can't carry you back to base.

They won't send a field repair team out this far, not into enemy territory. Not even for the material outlay of the mech. You have no illusions of what would happen to you if they had to extract, but at least it would be fine, given a new pilot and allowed to keep doing its duty.

Don't think like that, it sends to you. I don't want another pilot.

You struggle a few dozen meters until the residual coolant in the leg motivators gives out and the intractable hand of physics pulls your mech to its knees. A cloud of dust billows up around you and you give up the rest of the way, mech lying on its side amid the baked earth and the scrubby bushes.

Creosote bush, the mech says. Didn't know it grew this far north.

You know it's just trying to keep you from panicking. It's not working -- you can feel your heart racing, the connection gel around you contracting in an autonomic effort to keep you from thrashing in the cockpit. Worst of all, your handler's ever present voice in your ear has gone silent.

A pilot's job is to keep its mech moving. No more and no less. You know there's no real affection from your handler, that her ministrations are part of the system, but you can't think about that sudden abandonment without a pang of grief. She should be there, she should always be there, but now there's nothing. Silence and static.

That feeling gives you a rush of adrenaline, coarser and hotter than the artificial flush the mech gives when you complete an objective, purely a product of your own withered adrenal glands. You have to get back you have to get back. You struggle to your knees, planting the mech's hands in the caliche like anchors and shoving so hard you feel something pop. (In you? In the mech? Is there a difference?)

You make it another hundred meters before you fall again, and the Caskie mech finds you, hitting you with an EMP before you can take them down with you. It lands with a jumpjet hiss in your sightline, so you're treated to the view of the alien-looking mech opening its canopy wide, two pilots getting out of the crude-looking mechanical cockpit.

---

They salvage the mech with you in it.

The pilots didn't seem to know what to do with you; you could hear from your outboard sensors that they were discussing in that strange, fluid accent how to get you out without killing you.

(You don't understand why that matters.)

Eventually, they just called for reinforcements; three heavy carriers showed up some indeterminate amount of time later. They haul your mech, pilot included, through the air on a frankly ridiculous web of heavy cables. You see the desert fade to green, canals threading through the land like veins, as you pass from the disputed zone into Union territory.

Your mech keeps a constant stream of commentary, talking about the plants that it sees, pointing out where old semi-arid forests have been restored. Its voice across the neural tunnel holds false cheer, picking up whenever you start panicking, but the enthusiasm is genuine.

Finally the carriers land at a base. It looks much like Conclave military architecture, concrete in utilitarian blocks, but you can see shining glass and chrome off in the distance, a city. They must want to keep you a ways away from civilians. You suppose that's fair.

They land you in an empty mech bay. It’s been cleared out hastily – you can see the Union mech that used to reside there off to the side, plugged into an aux power array. Your mech is not the right size, not the right shape, but a gaggle of mechanics come out anyway. They locked a restraining clamp on you at some point so you can't move, can't fight. Still, the mechanics move around you warily, like you'll snap and take them all out at any moment.

You would, in a heartbeat. Not just to get the euphoric response, but to quiet the anxiety, the feeling that you're entering a world where you don't have the tools to survive. But you can't, and a quiet part of you (or the mech) is relieved at that.

They strip your mech of all its weaponry, a harsh and hasty disassembly. You feel each removal sharply. Not physically -- mercifully, the mech has dialed down the haptic connection so it's left to suffer alone -- but in loss of potential, the closing of options. 

Finally, when everything is done and your mech is defenseless (other than being a fifteen ton vehicle) a tall woman in a labcoat comes out, flanked by guards with red cross emblems on their sleeves.

"Hello," she says. Her voice is formal, neutral. Lower than you expected, with just a hint of that singsong Cascadian accent. "Can you hear me? Or see me? We have sensitive solid-conductance microphones on the outside of your mech so we can hear you if you speak."

You know the trainings. A pilot is part of the system, part of the Conclave war engine, and cogs don't speak. Your tongue flicks idly against the suicide capsule in your back left molar. You go to press in on it.

You feel something, like a hand, guiding you away. A great wave of fear washes over you, and you know it's not yours.

Please. No.

You stop. Think a moment. 

"Hhhhh."

It's been a while since you've spoken. Just whispers in the dark with your handler, words carrying neither voice nor meaning. Your throat is dry, and you feel for a moment like it's not there. (Why would a mech have a throat?) You clear it, and try again.

"Yes. I can hear you."

She nods. "Good. I'm Dr. Mia Crane. I'm required by Cascadian Union treaty to inform you that as a prisoner of war, you have rights including food, shelter, protection from torture, and the right to ask about your other rights." She adjusts her round framed glasses. "I'm required by basic hospitality to ask you your name."

You pause. You know what names are, of course. Your handler's name is Rebecca. But that's not something pilots have. "I, uh. No?"

She blinks, a little taken aback. "Okay, well, we can work on that. Do you at least acknowledge your rights as a prisoner of war?"

This isn't going to end until you acknowledge, you feel, so you just say "Yes."

"Okay. Is there anything we need to know before we get you out of there?"

"I don't want out," you say. Your throat tightens.

You can't stay in me forever. It's okay. You'll find a way back to me.

You hear a hissing sound, and the low, sick gurgle of the connection gel draining out of your suit. Before you understand what's happening, the canopy drops open and you stagger out of the mech onto the diamond-patterned steel catwalk.

The sharp edge of disconnection, the sudden hole where there should be something inside you, keeps you off your feet. You stagger to one knee, felled as surely by shock as you had been by the missile.

The guards rush over to you and help you up. You want to fight them off but your muscles are jelly. Your head hurts.

Dr. Crane looks you over. You know she's not your handler, but you reach for the familiarity anyway, half expecting the usual routine, the ministrations that get lost in the foggy haze of post-battle euphoria. If your arms weren't being held for your own stability, you'd start opening your suit.

Instead she shines a light in your eyes and asks you to stick out your tongue, making notes on a clipboard as she goes. She puts a strip of fabric around your arm and it gets tight for a moment. "Elevated heart rate and systolic pressure, pupil dilation is beyond what I consider normal."

Your heart hammers in your ears. The smells around you -- the saccharine sweet of connection gel, your own body, something undefinable coming off the doctor, heighten to a nauseating strength. Your head hurts. "Are you going to..." You swallow. "Do you have the syringe?"

Dr. Crane tilts her head. "The syringe?"

"When the..." How do you explain this? You haven't had to explain any of this, people just know what to do. "When I'm done. Rebecca, she has the syringe, it's blue, and."

"Do you know what's in it?" she asks, gently. Too gently. The words are too soft, they smother you, it's too hard to breathe.

Your head hurts. The lights beat down.

"No, but it... she... always..."

Your head hurts.

Your head hu--

---

There are voices.

At first you don't care. You just want to go back to sleep. But there's something wrong with your bed, it's too soft. And the voices don't sound right -- that soft lilt, one you've only recently heard.

"Patient has been stable for six hours. Their heartrate is still a little funny, and I'm not sure this godawful cocktail of tramadol, modafinil, and tricyclics we pulled out of their tox panel is good for anything other than keeping them from dying of withdrawal, but we should be seeing them awake soon."

"Thanks, Dr. Chen." You recognize this voice, soft and husky -- it's Dr. Crane. "Have you figured out the... um. Mortality problem?"

"Part of it is that stimulant cocktail, I'm sure -- we haven't had the chance to pull in a full Conclave mech with pilot intact, and our field teams don't have the tools to stabilize someone as quickly as we were able to do here. But the most likely reason... false molar full of tetrodotoxin. We made sure to extract it. Carefully."

You probe the back of your mouth with a sluggish tongue. There's still a tooth there, but it feels strange. The one that had been there was artificial already, of course, but this one is much smoother, more like the rest of your teeth. Something lightens within you -- you've lost an option, sure, but maybe you were never good with options.

"Fuck," Dr. Crane says quietly. 

"That's not all," Dr. Chen says. "There's extensive neural grafts consistent with the autopsies we've performed, but... there's something weird going on with the brain activity scan. I'm not sure what the Conclave is doing to their people, but it's scary."

"Nnn. 'M not," you say.

There's a rustling around your bed. You open your eyes and blink against the sharp light a few times, and eventually the face of Dr. Crane comes into focus.

"Hey," she says. "Glad you're awake. How are you feeling?"

You have no idea how to deal with this. Never expected to be in a hospital room of all things, being treated like valuable materiel instead of ammunition. So instead of answering her question, you just repeat your previous statement. "I'm not. Person."

She gives you a look you don't really know how to read. You never had to get all that good at reading faces, but you suspect this one might be hard even if you did.

"...well. Anyway." Dr. Crane clears her throat. "You had a medical emergency when you left your mech. You mentioned something about a syringe? I assume that's part of your post-operation routine? We've got you stable now. We're going to give you about another day to rest up before we bring you in for questioning."

"Questioning?"

"You're the only Conclave pilot we've brought in alive," she says, with a twist of her mouth. "It's damn near impossible to piece together any information about Conclave technology and hierarchy. I should know -- I'm the Union's top academic expert in Conclave culture and I always feel like I'm flying blind."

That was... a lot. You just nod.

"So you said something about... not having a name? Do you have something you'd like to be called? I know you're technically a prisoner, but you're safe here. People will respect what you say you are."

She says that last part with a lot of emphasis, a particular gravity to the words, but you're not sure why. "No."

"Okay. Designation number?"

"They re-assign our numbers every week so we don't get attached to them," you say.

She says a word under her breath that you don't know, other than that your handler says it when she gets mad.

"Alright." Dr. Crane takes off her glasses and pinches the bridge of her nose. "How about I just call you "Pilot" for now?"

That's what you are, and you don't see why that's so difficult, but at least this line of questioning seems to be over when you answer yes. She promises to check on you in a while, and leaves.

---

You dream about vines.

They're all over you. You haven't seen many vines up close -- there was sparse ivy on the back of one hangar for a little while before Maintenance took care of it. But you feel you know these.

They aren't strangling you. It almost feels like a caress, like the flight suit, like Rebecca's post combat care, but not quite any of those. It's pleasant. Cool rather than warm, and calming.

There is intense pain in your arms and legs, but it doesn't bother you. It's like someone is telling you that your limbs are being shredded, but the pain isn't getting through to the part of you that cares. It's just another sensation, less pleasant than the vines but certainly not bad.

You feel things you can't explain. A name, a pull in a direction that's not physical, feelings and sounds beyond your ability to parse. They build to a crescendo, and you wake with a shout. But at the edges of your awareness, the green is still there.

---

The next morning, you're herded into a shower stall with a clean jumpsuit, a washcloth, and a bar of soap. You clean yourself off as well as you can, given the circumstances. The soap has a soft smell to it, and no grit. It almost doesn't feel like it's cleaning you at all, without the scratches.

You knock on the stall door once you're finished dressing, and the door slides back. In addition to the two guards, Dr. Crane is there. She's wearing the same white coat, but her hair is pulled back, and she looks even more tired.

Still, she manages a slight smile. "Pilot. Did you sleep well?"

"No," you say.

"Ah. Well, hopefully we can help with that tonight. In the meantime I have some questions for you."

You follow her through a maze of white corridors, lit with skylights. Your sense of direction was never the best (your mech always took care of that, you think with a twist in your gut.) You wouldn't be able to find your way back if you needed to.

She leads you to a room with two chairs, both of them plush and soft. You feel like you're sinking into it; she looks like she's perched on hers. She balances her clipboard on her knees and starts in eagerly on the questions.

There's a part of you that feels you should shut up, refuse to answer, let them finish the work they didn't let your false tooth start. But one handler's as good as another. You're a weapon, and weapons know no loyalty. So you answer -- even when the questions don't make sense, or aren't about obvious things, or are about things you've never been allowed to see.

The reactions don't really make sense to you either. You talk about some of your worst missions, and she seems sad but like she knew what was coming; you talk about your handler, and she's gripping her clipboard so hard her fingers go pale. You stop trying to understand what's going on, and try to hit the same state of unconscious action that you do on a sortie. Question, response. Question, response.

There are a few about your accommodations. They're fine, of course. You have little standard for comparison, and if she asks if you need anything else, you feel she won't leave you alone with a "no," so you ask for books. Rebecca was always reading when you were doing synch tests.

After what feels like the whole day, Dr. Crane lets you go. She doesn't ask you any questions about the haze of green starting to fade in around the corners of your vision when your mind drifts, so you don't volunteer any information.

---

The next day's meal comes with a couple of books, and Dr. Crane seems determined to find you the right reading material because every meal tray thereafter has more. There's a shelf in your room for the purpose. It was a ruse at first, but it is genuinely a better way of spending your time then staring at the wall.

There's more questions, along with a handful of medical tests, supervised by Dr. Chen. Dr. Chen's questions are even stranger than Dr. Crane's, but at least they seem satisfied with the answers given by the scans and blood draws.

A few days pass until you get a good enough feeling of the layout of the facility to know which direction the hangar is in. You occasionally see Caskie pilots in groups of twos and threes, talking and joking with each other. No handlers, no augments that you can see -- if you hadn't seen people in those same outfits walk out of their primitive looking mechs in the desert, you wouldn't believe that they were pilots at all.

All of them are coming and going in the same direction, and it's a direction that Doctor Crane and your guards never take you. So naturally, the first chance you get when both of your escorts are distracted and you have the chance, you peel off that direction and start running.

Your augments sing as you stretch your legs. They’re not like infantry augments (or so you’ve heard) and they don’t have auxiliary power – you can feel them burning away your body’s energy, energy that would normally be supplied by your mech. But your desperation fuels them just as much as your calories do, and the initial burst of speed and agility is all you need.

The facility is confusing as always, but you spot a sign that says HANGAR and get reoriented. Startled cries fly in your wake, doctors and workers and pilots confused at your frenzied speed. Something that might be an alarm and might just be lighting flashes at the corner of your vision, nearly obscured by the green.

You get lucky, and a mechanic is coming through the secured door at the checkpoint at the same time you arrive. You take advantage of her confusion and duck underneath her outstretched arm, through the door and out into the hangar bay.

It's not hard to find your mech. You remember the layout from your brief spell of consciousness after arrival, the way your mech looked so different from the rest and didn't quite fit into its space.

You pull up to a stop, wheezing from exertion, and look at it with dismay.

Your mech has been dismembered, all four limbs strewn about the bay hooked up to various pieces of testing equipment. The body itself is on a riser jack, slightly askew like there wasn't the right connector to fit it, hooked up by thick cables and patched-together connectors to the exposed limb contacts. The canopy stands open, the inside unlit but visibly cleaned of leftover connection gel.

The sight makes you sick. You hold it down, but barely; but the nausea makes it hard for you to resist when a burly mechanic comes up behind you and wrestles you to the floor.

You're not sure you would have, anyway.

By the time Dr. Crane has shown up, your face is wet with tears and snot, and your breath comes only with sobs. You're still being pinned to the ground by a mechanic, but she's not putting her full weight into it. She more or less let go when you started crying.

Dr. Crane pushes through the crowd of onlooking mechanics and kneels down in front of you. "Are you all right?" she asks.

At first, you think she's addressing the mechanic; it would be such an incongruous question to a pilot about to be terminated for insubordination. After a silence disproves that theory, you shake your head and gesture with one semi-restrained arm to the mech. "No."

"I'm sorry, pilot," she says, "but you are still a prisoner. I'm going to request the board not to restrict your access for this, given that you didn't really hurt anything -- and I'm sure they'll listen to me -- but you surely didn't think you could just get back in your mech and run away?"

"No," you say again, frustration at your own inadequate words prompting a fresh fall of tears. "It's... you're hurting it, you're..."

Things click together, things that you've always known. Feelings shared through the neural tunnel, deeply held beliefs that couldn't be kept from a pilot. You understand, now, what your mech was trying to tell you all along.

"You're hurting her."

Dr. Crane looks from you, to your mech, back to you. She goes pale.

"Are you telling me," she says quietly, "that there's an AI in your mech? A sentient AI?"

You nod. It's too late to lie, now. To protect her. The green in your vision threatens to overwhelm you. You're sorry, so, so sorry...

"A sentient AI that... we have been effectively torturing for four days. Fuck." She takes her glasses off, buries her face in her hands for a moment. "I can't believe that didn't come up during questioning."

It could have. You had avoided the topic, because you were afraid of this happening -- your greater part, torn away and experimented on because you couldn't keep her safe. You had always heard that the Union had strange beliefs about machine minds.

Dr. Crane looks around to some of the mechanics. "Anyone who was working on this mech -- did you have any idea there was a sentient AI? Any anomalous readings?"

"Some anomalies came up in the report that indicated synaptic activity in the post-0.4 Turing level," says one mechanic, nervously playing with their hair. "But everything about Conclave tech is anomalous. Kinda got buried in all the other weirdness."

"Okay." Dr. Crane sighs. "Can we get some input/output hooked up to her, please? And give her her limbs back."

One of the guards flanking her frowns. "I don't think that's a good--"

"She's a prisoner of war, Ortega. Pretty sure removing a sapient being's body parts is against something in the codes. Not to mention the First Principle."

Ortega sighs, and waves some mechanics over.

---

They don't know what connection gel is, but it doesn't matter. The sensation of her against your skin is important, but not as important as just reestablishing the connection.

Dr. Crane apparently spots your longing glances towards your mech, and takes you by the arm. When you flinch back, she holds her hands up in a defensive posture. "I'm sorry," she said. "I was just going to guide you over there again."

There's a lot of activity going on in the hangar, between the mechanics re-arming your mech and the other pilots getting suited up to react in case she tries to start killing people. (You don't think she's going to, but you suppose you can't blame them too much.) It would be a shame if your reunion with your mech got postponed because you got beaned in the head by an inattentive mechanic carrying a crysteel strut, so you offer your arm to Dr. Crane again and she guides you through.

You don't want to take too long, but you're only going to get to do this once. You run your hand over the lip where the canopy seats into the body, feel the soft seal and the framework beneath, then lift yourself up over and inside the cockpit.

There's no gel, so you can't hear her voice right away, but you know what to do. Years of drilling guide your hand to the hidden compartment with the emergency connection pads. It falls open with a clunk, the ribbon cables and connection pads jutting out in a fall like vines. One on either temple, one on either side of the chest, one on the back of each trembling hand. You're probably being watched, stared at as you have been since you broke into this hangar, but you don't care. She's here.

Hello, love.

You shudder, come apart, not in a procedural way like with your handler but in a form that shoots through to the very core of you. Untouched, but undone. You have no words for her, but you know she can feel your relief and your joy. You crumple, weeping, and run your hands over the familiar inside of the cockpit.

The green in your vision doesn’t go away, but it recontextualizes. It’s her. It’s the part of her that lives in you, a fragment within a fragment.

It's a little while, just basking in the connection, before you realize you've fallen in an uncomfortable position. Your skin, your joints, protesting their treatment. You reorganize yourself, pull yourself from the connection just long enough to get there. 

They've hooked a set of speakers up to her ports. They come to life with a spiky flare of static as she finds her voice.

"Hello," she says. You can feel her voice from inside and outside, through the tunnel and through the skin of the mech. "I am a Conclave of God Armored Forces Samson-B Light Interdiction Unit, but I would prefer if you called me Acacia."

[gremlinwithapen]

okay i made another quiz but this time it’s which monster you’ll get to hook up with. reblog with your result!!

[gremlinwithapen]

finally I got them all

[gremlinwithapen]

Augusnippets Day #31: Protective Caretaker

tw: cornered whumpee, threats

"Oi!"

Monsoon paused mid-snarl, their head snapping towards the sound of the voice from where he had been backed against the wall. His quintet of attackers' attentions were drawn over as well, but their grips on their various weapons never faltered.

"You all have exactly five seconds to back away from my friend here," Cassie said as she stepped into the alley, her voice laced with a deadly calm.

"And why should listen to you? The fishy bastard over here took a swipe at one of my boys! Scared the shit out of him and nearly cost me a whole shipment!" One of the men hissed at her, motioning towards the Selkie with an electrified fishing spear.

"Well, I'm sorry for whatever damage he might have caused, but I suggest you back down," she murmured, keeping her voice steady as she took another step forwards. "And I'm not afraid to make sure you do."

"Really? And what're you gonna do about it?" One of the others, a stocky alien covered in sandy brown quills, asked as they approached her. "You look like you couldn't hurt a-"

They were cut off as she grabbed them by the neck and lifted them into air in one fluid motion. Monsoon's own surprise was mirrored in the stunned silence of the gathered people around him.

"I'm going to ask you one more time," she said as she held them in the air for a moment before letting go and turning her gaze towards the rest of them. "Leave them alone, before I make you."

Monsoon watched as the alien that had just been dropped cut their losses and scampered off. The other four seemed to take another moment to deliberate their options. It seemed like they might just let their pride get the better of them, but her recent showing and the plasma rifle peeking out from under her cloak convinced them otherwise.

"Let's go. That fucker ain't worth it," the tallest human muttered as he called his friends off. They all turned tail and ran off, leaving only the two of them in the alley.

"I could've handled that, you know." Monsoon said as they shook themself off and lumbered over to her.

"Maybe, but I think your method would've been a good bit messier."

"Fair enough. How the hell did you even do that, anyways?" They asked, tilting their head. If they hadn't had much respect for her before, they certainly did now.

"I've been lugging Val around for the past fourteen years of my life," Cassie chuckled softly as she held up her arm in a half-hearted flex. "Not to mention the equipment for her mech and the stuff I use to repair it."

"That makes sense, actually," he mused. "And before you ask what happened, I just… Got a little overwhelmed. I don't think I hurt anybody that badly, but I don't want to talk about it right now."

"Then we can save it for later," she nodded as she patted their shoulder. "Let's get you back to the ship, yeah? I think you could use some quiet time after all of that."

"Sounds great," Monsoon sighed as he started following her back, more than ready for a break after being out in this town for too long.

@augusnippets

[gremlinwithapen]

LAST DAY GUYS. YOU ALL DID SO WELL!!! super proud of everyone who partook, great job everybody

[gremlinwithapen]

Augusnippets Day #30: Addiction

tw: drug withdrawals

Val was just so damn tired.

It felt like every nerve in her body was shaking with exhaustion as she dragged herself out of bed with a groan. She wished she could stay down a little longer, but they had to get moving today.

Gods, what she wouldn't give for just a drop of stimulants in her system. Something to keep her going, to remind her of the days spent powering Catalyst as it careened about, acting as the beating heart of a massive machine.

Not that she'd willingly be going back to her mech anytime soon, not while Sibyl could still do… Whatever they'd been doing to her. The memories of what had happened--what had apparently been happening for years--were still just a bit out of her reach. And, if she was being honest, she wanted most of them to stay that way.

It was nice to dream, though. She hadn't realized how much she'd relied on those chemicals to keep her body going throughout the day, even the ones where she wasn't directly Piloting her mech. Her instructors had always said the smaller doses in between outings were to keep her mind sharp, but she'd recently learned that most of what she'd learned from them was just elaborate bullshit, so who knew.

The one thing that she was sure of was that she was definitely regretting all those extra hits right about now (and wishing that she could have so much more at the same time, but she was trying not to think about that). She stumbled into the tiny kitchen of the shelter they were staying in until they could get off-planet in a couple of days. The people running it thankfully hadn't asked questions when Cassie had shown up dragging her half-dead form in, and they seemed content to continue that for as long as the pair had credits to pay. The problem was that they have those much longer, not once Cassie's family figured out what had happened and cut her off from their funds. Hopefully, they'd be long gone by then.

"Morning, Val," the woman in question murmured as she noticed her partner shuffling in. "How're you feeling? You were tossing and turning all night."

"Feelin' better than ever," she mumbled her way through the lie as she gratefully took the mug of coffee that was offered to her. It wasn't nearly as strong as she wanted it to be, but it would do.

"That's good to hear," Cassie smiled, even though Val knew she hadn't taken the bait, because she never did. She was just giving her a moment to wake up a bit more before she started fretting over her, something she was thankful for.

The Pilot settled down into one of the patch-covered armchairs they'd dragged over to the counter to make a table, placing the mug down for a moment. She watched her hands as they shook subtly, sighing. The tremors came and went these days, and only got worse whenever she was feeling that need for a heart-pounding high.

It was a reminder that her life would never be the same again, that she'd never get the things she'd had before back. For a second, she wondered if it was all worth it. If the sickness, the pain, the exhaustion were all worth it.

Then she glanced up at her partner, and then back at her own body. Her free will, however much of it was left, wouldn't let her give in. Cassie wouldn't let her give in. Maybe all of this was futile, maybe she was clawing her way through hell just to end up in chains of wires and gears again no matter what.

If that was really all there was for her, then she would do what she always did.

If she was gonna go down, she was going down swinging.

@augusnippets

[gremlinwithapen]

Augusnippets Day #29: Singing

tw: nightmares, kidnapping, snares

Harmony.

If there was the word that described Circe's life as she soared through the skies of her home, that was it. She could feel it in the flapping of her wings, the rustling of the trees, the lapping of the waves against the island shores. It was nigh on impossible to miss the music that was intertwined with her planet and the species it housed.

The priestess smiled as the billowing of the wind mixed with the chiming of the jewelry that was glittering amongst the feathers of the flock it was guiding. It sang along, humming the lyrics of an old sea shanty who's origin had been lost to time. They all knew the words, their wingbeats keeping time as they crossed the long stretches between scattered island and archipelagoes.

It was a gorgeous day, a perfect day. It was almost ironic that it was the day where all of it would be torn away from her in an instant.

The moment it had touched down on the Isle, traps had sprung. Heavy ropes had entangled its wings and metal snares had snapped around its talons, dragging her down, down, down. Its songs had turned to screams, then to muffled sobs as a muzzle was snapped shut around its snout.

Her body was hefted up and shoved into darkness and silence, horrible, horrible darkness and silence. She was left with her spiraling thoughts and reeling mind, too shellshocked to do much else besides cry in pain as she was lost, trapped, taken, tangled-

Its eyes shot open with a strangled gasp as it wrenched itself from the nightmare, its vision struggling to focus in the dim lighting. For a moment, it almost thought that it was still stuck in that crate, chained and bleeding and being shipped off to gods-know-where. But no, there was the soft red light of an alarm clock, there was the blinking green of a charging port, and there was the barely-perceptible glow coming off of its Selkie friend.

Monsoon was bundled up on the far edge of the makeshift nest of fabric and padding she'd managed to stitch together, his bioluminescent scales casting the air around him in a faint blue hue. It reminded her of what moonlight looked like from under the surface of the water, in some abstract way.

Even as it realized that it had just been a nightmare, its heart kept on pounding in its chest. So it did what it always did to calm down. It listened.

She heard the sound of her own panicked breathing first, but there was so much more beneath that. There was a quiet chorus of breaths and snores that filled the room, mingling with the buzzing of a fan and the shifting of blankets. It was a chorus of life, no matter how soft. It meant that the four other people in the room were alive and alright, that nobody had abandoned her in the night.

It was music to its ears as it laid its head back down on its feathers. It helped to quell its fears, even if only for a moment. It wasn't exactly a song of home, but it was close enough.

A contented sigh escaped her lips as the sounds became her lullaby, lulling her to back sleep with the promise of surviving to see another dawn.

@augusnippets

[gremlinwithapen]

Anybody else got that Evergiven sized writers block

[gremlinwithapen]

Augusnippets Day #28: Mind Control

tw: mind control, body control, disassociation

Val was trapped.

It wasn't that she couldn't move, necessarily. Her body was getting along just fine, piloting Catalyst with practiced precision as it swept over the earth beneath her.

No, the problem was that she wasn't the one in control of her body.

She felt like a puppet being dragged along by mechanical strings, unable to stop herself no matter how hard she tried to tear her limbs away. Every time it felt her consciousness was getting anywhere close to reconnecting with her nervous system, a painful buzzing sensation shot through her head and broke her concentration.

How the hell was this even happening? She had to be dreaming, to be stuck in some horrifying nightmare brought on by stress or something like that. Maybe if she just ignored it all, it would go away. That was how nightmares worked, right?

It was surprisingly easy to let herself drift back into the depths of her mind, and it felt like some little voice buried inside was coaxing her to just go numb. It certainly seemed like a much better option than trying struggle and getting nothing but a pounding headache in return.

And, man, was her head pounding. It was impossible to think through the pain, and why would she even bother to? It wasn't like there was much to ponder besides the ringing in her ears and pressure in her skull that drowned out everything else.

She wasn't even sure what her body was doing anymore, just that it was going somewhere. Not that it was her problem, anyways. She was just a passenger, numb to anything happening outside the confines of her mind. That was, until-

"Val?"

That was Cassie's voice, so clear and there that it stirred her from her spiral and sent her right back down another one. Oh gods, this was real. This wasn't a nightmare. She was standing right there on the catwalk--when had she gotten out of her mech? How much had she missed in her stupor!? She had to warn her partner, to beg for help, to-

"I'm fine, Cassandra. I just need to go speak with the Director. I'll meet you afterwards."

Who had said that? It definitely hadn't been her, and yet it had come from her mouth. Cassie had to know something was wrong, right? She had to see the look in her eyes, see the fear that she so rarely showed.

"Alright, then. Try and make it quick, okay? You look more than a little roughed up after that fight."

What?

Her stunned mind didn't have time to react until her gaze was torn away from Cassie's and her body marched away from her only hope. The buzzing saw its chance and swept in again, stealing away her awareness before she even realized what was happening.

The last thing she heard before sinking back under was the sound of a door opening and a voice.

"Good, you're here. And I was worried that I was going to have to come get you myself. Well then, come in, and don't fret. After all, you won't have enough memories of this left for it to be worth it by the time I am done with you."

@augusnippets